Shuttleworth Says No Patent Deals With Microsoft

christian.einfeldt writes "The FOSS press has speculated for some time now that Mark Shuttleworth would probably not agree to any patent 'protection' deals with Microsoft, but blogger Steven Rosenberg has found a page on Shuttleworth's personal blog ('Here Be Dragons') that unambiguously sets out Shuttleworth's opposition to Canonical's participation in any such deal. Rosenberg summarizes Shuttleworth's position in these terms: 'So there you have it — Canonical welcomes any efforts by Microsoft to improve "interoperability," isn't a fan of OpenXML, doesn't want to infringe on anybody's patents or trademarks, thinks Microsoft's threats are ill-advised, and would like to actually deal with the issue rather than respond out of fear.'

Comments

Stuff that matters?

[aysa]

So now we have a site for nerds, that quotes an unknown blogger quoting Shuttleworth.

Great, I will link to the slashdot article in my blog. Maybe I get slashdotted and we get a dupe.

Cant't we go straight to the source?

Everyone kinda knew.

[Howitzer86]

Canonical is out of range of Microsoft's Patent arsenal. Mark is also a smart guy and knows what's really going on.

I think everyone kinda knew this already, though it is nice to be sure.

Re:Everyone kinda knew.

[rudlavibizon]

Also I get the impression that he's not in for making quick cash out of linux. It looks like he has long term plans, not just with linux as a platform, but with free software as a development/business model.

Re:Everyone kinda knew.

[RobertLTux]

umm news flash most likely due to folks raising Holy Hell about it they have stated that they will in fact do the 4 year "CompleteCare" on linux systems
(and i just checked and the option is back up) They said that somebody more or less fat fingered the data base (oops we sowii)

source

[wizardforce]

here is the source: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/125#comme nt-112738 It is good to know Mark doesn't fold under bogus patent threats like novell/xandros/linspire did. keep up the good work Ubuntu :)

Re:source

[gilesjuk]

Indeed. Besides, the threats only affect those selling Linux. Microsoft can try and stop community Linux, but the backlash would be huge.

Is it really so hard...

[choongiri]

...to link direct to Shuttleworth's post on his blog?

Looking forward to the consolidation.

[IGnatius T Foobar]

This is great. Hopefully the Linux community will now consolidate around Canonical and Red Hat -- already, two leaders who have done well by listening to what people want and simply delivering quality free software without any strings attached -- now, the two who are sane enough to avoid getting in bed with Microsoft.

As the also-rans sign their lives away to the Beast of Redmond, their users will disappear. They will become irrelevant, because nobody wants to run Microsoft Linux. And the fragmentation of Linux will gradually go away as everyone consolidates around Ubuntu and Red Hat (and Red Hat respins such as CentOS).

I'm looking forward to it.

Re:Who?

[jeiler]

Shuttleworth runs Canonical Ltd, the folks who sponsor U/Ku/Xu/Edubuntu.

Re:Who?

[pherthyl]

If your readers have to look up the subject of the article, you've got it wrong.

Because news should only ever be about things everyone already knows! Heaven forbid that you might learn something new.

Re:Who?

[jez9999]

You might at least say who this guy is. We aren't all experts on the personnel of every Linux distribution.

Please turn in your Slashdotter card, and exit the building. The hounds will be released in 5 minutes. :-)

Here it goes...

[wellingj]

Eben Moglen has stated that there is a Waterloo to be fought some where in this current attack from Microsoft. I think this situation is more analogous to the American Revolutionary War because this is more about freedom. I believe Mark Shuttleworth has accomplished the equivalent of the Boston Tea party with his statements. In effect he's saying that he won't pay the Microsoft tax on his freedom, regardless of how insignificant or silly the medium of that tax. We all (should?) know what happened 2 years after the Tea Party :

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled;
Here once the embattled farmers stood;
And fired the shot heard 'round the world.

So who will it be?

summaries help busy readers

[christian.einfeldt]

I linked to Steven Rosenberg's blog because he did a great job of finding a comment buried deep in Mark Shuttleworth's blog and because he nicely summarized Shuttleworth's opinion. Rosenberg broke that story by exhuming it from lots of other content on Shuttleworth's very active blog. Without Rosenberg's blog highlighting of Shuttleworth's blog entry, we /. readers would not have noticed it. Shuttleworth posted his comment on 15 June 2007, and a full day passed without that comment being noticed on /., which is a long time for a comment by the founder of a major GNU Linux distro to go unnoticed by /.

Also, Rosenberg saved busy readers a bit of time by summarizing Shuttleworth's longer opinion. Shuttleworth clearly took the time to make sure that his comments were diplomatic and well-rounded, but the result is that his comments were not subject to the kind of quick-glance summary that many /. readers need.

So, in summary, I felt that Rosenberg provided two important journalistic services, and that he deserved to get the attention and traffic for his good work.

Aysa is critical of the decision to link to Roseberg's blog, but IMHO, Aysa's criticism is directed more toward his or her disdain for bloggers and evinces a bias toward big media. Aysa would have had no complaint if this same summary had appeared on say Newsforge. Notice that Aysa doesn't complain about the caliber of Rosenberg's summary or Rosenberg's editorial choice to discuss Shuttleworth's blog. Indeed, Aysa could not have made such complaints, because Rosenberg's summary is pithy and his choice to run a comment by news-making Shuttleworth was unimpeachable. Rosenberg's only "fault" was the fact that his work did not appear on Newsforge. IMHO, Aysa's criticism of the link to a blogger therefore lacks substance and shows a meritless disdain merely for Rosenberg's status. If journalism is good, it's good regardless of where it appears.